Although Relatively Few, “Doctor Shoppers” Skew Opioid Prescribing
One out of every 143 U.S. patients who received a prescription for an opioid painkiller in 2008 obtained prescriptions from multiple physicians in a pattern that suggests misuse or abuse of the drugs, according to a recent estimate. While these “doctor shoppers” comprised only 0.7 percent of all patients with opioid prescriptions, they purchased almost 2 percent of all such prescriptions and 4 percent of the total amount of opioid drugs measured by weight. Dr. Douglas McDonald and Kenneth Carlson of the research firm Abt Associates, Inc., of Cambridge, Massachusetts, derived national estimates